Category Archives: Ethiopian

A couple friends of mine made a game
and they named their stupid game company after this riddle
which happens to be VERY OLD.
When I told them how old the riddle was
they were like “holy shit we’ll pay you to do a re-telling of it”
and I was like “well I was just going to I MEAN YES PAY ME”
then I loaded up the post I’d already written
and changed exactly nothing about it
except this little preamble
about how you should seriously buy their really cool game
it’s about fooling nazis and you can watch me win at it on twitch sometimes
anyway, let me tell you about this dumb farmer and his problems.

Right so there’s this farmer
let’s call him Dick
Dick is not a very successful farmer
as evidenced by the fact that he has to go to the store
to buy a goat
a cabbage
and for some reason
a wolf
you would think if he needed cabbages
he could grow some on the farm that he has
the goat makes sense
but why the fuck does he need a wolf?
wolves are like the exact thing you want to keep out of your farm
and this dude is spending money
(which he probably doesn’t have a lot of
seeing as he can’t even grow fucking cabbages)
to ACQUIRE THE THING HE IS MOST AFRAID OF
that would be like being afraid of nuclear weapons
and so purchasing a bunch of oh
oh okay I get it.

Anyway the only store in the area
that sells both goats AND wolves AND cabbages
is on the other side of the river
so he rents a boat to get to the store
further increasing the cost of this errand
and then on the way back
he realizes he has a problem
i mean
he realizes he has a brand new problem
on top of all his previously existing problems.
The problem is this:
the boat can only hold him and one of this three dumb purchases.
if he leaves the wolf alone with the goat
the wolf will eat the goat
(this will likely still be a problem on the farm
also I wouldn’t feel great about having a wolf in a boat with me)
If he leaves the goat alone with the cabbage
the goat will eat the cabbage
and the grass under the cabbage
and the dirt
and any part of the mantle soft enough to chew
because goats are awful

so how does he solve this problem he created for himself?
SPOILERS:
he takes the goat across
then he takes the cabbage across
but he doesn’t just leave the goat there with the cabbage
because despite all prior evidence, he is not an idiot
no, he brings the goat BACK WITH HIM
and then LEAVES IT ON THE ORIGINAL SHORE and takes the wolf
then he puts the wolf with the cabbage
and goes and gets the goat
which has probably eaten half of the landscape by now
and the farmer lives happily ever after
until his long string of bad business decisions finally ruin him.

That’s the least interesting part of this story, though
the MOST interesting part
is that this riddle shows up fucking EVERYWHERE
Italy, Estonia, Russia, Scotland, fuckin Ghana
Ethiopia, Russia, seriously, EVERYWHERE
but my favorite version of the story comes from Zimbabwe.
Now in this version
our hero has acquired not three, but FOUR incompatible items:
a leopard, a goat, a rat, and a basket of corn.
He can still only take one thing across the river at a time
so what the fuck is he gonna do?
If he takes the goat across, the rat eats the grain
if he takes the grain across, the goat eats the rat probably
goats eat anything
if he takes the leopard across, he’s in a boat with a leopard
there’s no winning
so the dude is like “hmm
maybe i should get rid of one of these rowdy animals
then this problem would have a logical solution
but I can’t do that
these animals are like family to me
ever since I drove away my family with my dumb purchases
you know what?
fuck this logic puzzle
I don’t need to cross that river
I live here now.”
and that’s what he does.

So the moral of the story
is if you’re the kind of person who spends money on wild carnivores
don’t try to logic your way out of the problem
fucking own your stupidity.

some awesome masked superherodonated ten dollars to meTENAMERICAN DOLLARSwhat does that mean guys?that means that if some combination of caped internet vigilantesgives me a total of TEN MORE DOLLARSI will do a video mythof the ENTIRE FUCKING ILIADskipping all the boring partsguys my car is broken yesterday I sat in my broken carwith a large bisexual manwho conducted a very personal interviewfor three hoursbecause he said he would pay me 40 dollarsit cost me 50 dollars to get my car towed

anyway here’s a myth

so I hope you like ethiopia guysbecause this is the most ETHIOPIAN GODDAMN MYTHyou have heard ALL WEEKunless you are in the habit of seeking out and readingvery ethiopian mythsand even theni feel like those would probably just beexactly the same amount of ethiopian as this myth

basically there is this taxi okthe taxi driver is giving three animals a ridebecause either he is crazy and has nothing better to door he is an idiot who thinks animals have moneyanyway the animals in his car are a donkeya goatand a dog

so the driver comes up to the donkey’s stopand the donkey is like here you go sirhere is exact changefollowed by a reasonable tip for your servicesand the taxi driver is like I KNEW ANIMALS HAD MONEYTHEY ALL LAUGHEDBUT I KNEWand then he speeds off

so then he comes up on the goat’s stopand the goat does a fucking dive roll out of the carlike HAHA LOOKS LIKE NOT ALL ANIMALS HAVE MONEY ASSHOLESEE YOU IN HELL THUNDERTITSand runs the fuck away

so now it’s just the dog and the taxi driver in the carand the taxi driver goes ahead and drives the dogall the way to his stopand it is pretty awkward the whole waybecause likethe dog’s friend just ripped the cabby off for 20 bucks or whateverbut finally they get to dog’s houseand the dog hands the cabbie a hundooh wowdid i just fucking say hundodammit now i am going to have to spend the rest of the weekgoing back through the events of my lifeto figure out when i became someone i never wanted to beanyway dog gives the driver a largeLARGEbilland is like may i have some change please sirand the cabbie is like NUPLOOKS LIKE YOU’RE PAYING FOR YOUR ASSHOLE FRIEND TOOVROOM BITCHand he takes off

so of course dog is like AW FUCK NOand starts running after the caband that is how it has been ever since:

dogs run after cabs trying to get their hundos back

goats get the fuck out of dodge cause they still owe money

and donkeys do not give a fuck

so this is actually a very instructive myththere is a lot of wisdom to be gaineddepending on who you are

if you are a donkeydon’t worry about ityou’re good

if you’re a goatwhat the fuck assholecome on

if you’re a dogtry carrying exact changeand having less shitty friendsalso instead of running after a fucking cartrying running after your shitty friendeven though he probably doesnt have any moneyprolly spent it all on booze and goatwhores

and finallyif you are a taxi driverwhich is more likely because you can readdo not give rides to animalseven if they do have moneywhich they shouldn’tbecause they are animalsone in three of them is going to rip you offalthough if one doesyou can always steal the money from a dogwhich shouldn’t be hard cuz they are already running after your car